Morning Mental Prep to Begin Your Day the Right Way

Who hasn’t had mornings like this: You’re rushing around—dressing, breakfast, gathering what you need—trying to make it successfully out the door so you can get to where you need to be on-time? Sounds a little chaotic—because it is. Our mornings generally determine our day. With May being Mental Health and Awareness Month, we wanted to focus on some morning mental prep to begin your day the right way.

The point of mentally preparing is to get our mind focused on the day and what lies ahead. One way to start the mornings off right is to eliminate carried over stress from the night before. So before we tackle the morning, let’s settle the evening:

Evening Tip #2 – Get enough sleep. Put the cell phone down and set to “do not disturb.” Start winding down about an hour before bedtime. Some people function better on 6 hours a night, others need 8. Determine your magic number and aim for it every night.

Now that we have the night before squared away, here’s the morning mental prep:

Morning Tip #1 – Quiet Time. With enough sleep, the snooze should get a break. Wake up with enough time to have 15 minutes of time to be alone in a quiet space. It could be meditation, sitting on the porch with hot tea or coffee or take a brisk walk as the sun is rising—whatever works for you to allow your mind to be still.

Morning Tip #2 – Positive Focus. We have control over our actions, thoughts and attitude. We can choose the “glass is half full” approach in life or the “half empty”. As you get ready for the day, think on that positivity in your life—whether it’s things like, health, work, transportation, or people. If your personality struggles with optimism, post positive quotes or sayings where you can see them every morning. Regardless of our circumstances, we can overcome the challenges of life and make positive changes—it all starts with attitude.

Gratitude is the attitude that sets the altitude for how we should live.

Morning Tip #3 – Fuel up. Some people choose to just have coffee in the mornings, but breakfast is a meal that shouldn’t be skipped. It is reported that breakfast helps with our cognitive functions (memory), our work performance, weight loss (believe it or not) and can reduce our risk of heart disease and diabetes. If you’re not a fan of breakfast, try something light. Granola and yogurt, a banana, instant oatmeal or breakfast bars are quick and simple too.

So, morning prep is determined by our evening prep and how our days go are determined by our mornings. Around and around it goes. Hope this inspires you with positive vibes as you start your day.

**Morning Mental Prep Challenge**: Start Sunday night by using the evening tips and Monday morning, the morning tips. Continue it for the full week. We’d love to hear how it goes for you!